


When Time Slows Down

by Viwiel



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV), The Losers (2010)
Genre: Gen, Hospital, POV Buffy Summers, Pre-The Losers (Movie), Prompt Fic, Surgery, hospital waiting rooms, meeting your kind of sister's kind of boyfriend, post-season 7 BtVS
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-13
Updated: 2020-01-13
Packaged: 2021-02-27 06:27:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 781
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22242571
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Viwiel/pseuds/Viwiel
Summary: Buffy's sitting in a hospital outside of surgery when a group of five men comes in.
Relationships: Faith Lehane & Buffy Summers, Faith Lehane/Franklin Clay
Kudos: 14





	When Time Slows Down

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Khiela Cadona (Khiela)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Khiela/gifts).



> Answer to the following prompt:
> 
> Somebody needs to be injured – how severely is up to you.  
> Low, gravelly voice.  
> Dog tags.  
> ‘This isn’t fucking Narnia, X!’”
> 
> Takes place somewhere after season 7 of BtVS and is pre-movie on the Losers.

She only noticed she’d been been clenching her hands together when Dawn laid her hand on them. She glanced at her, momentarily taking her eyes off the door that led to the operating room. She had been staring at it for closer to an hour now in an almost statue-like manner with all her senses on alert, listening for any signs they’d be done. She put some conscious effort into relaxing the muscles of her hands and managed to get the whiteness that had taken over her knuckles to slowly recede.

She absently opened and closed her hands to get the blood coursing through them again as she shifted her focus on her surroundings. There weren’t any noticeable changes since the last time she had taken a break from the worried thoughts coursing through her head. The hallway they were sitting in was still empty, if you didn’t count the two of them and a couple of nurses who walked by every now and then. The walls around them were painted in a sickly shade of green, one typical of hospitals. She supposed they were meant to be calming or something to that extend. Didn’t really help, if you asked her.

There was a radio was playing somewhere down the hall, and she could faintly hear the low, gravelly voice of Leonard Cohen sing about a cold and broken Hallelujah.

She absently wondered when Faith had last gone to church, and if she should pay a visit to the hospital chapel. Not that praying had ever helped her, but it never hurt to try. It wasn’t for herself, so maybe the powers or the big guy upstairs would take a pity and be merciful on the woman in surgery. 

She didn’t know how long had passed when she was brought out of her more or less morbid thoughts again and back to the narrow hallway by the sound of someone talking. The clock on the wall told her it had been about fifteen minutes since Dawn went to get them some more coffee and something to eat. She had barely been aware of that, never noticing that a group of five men had arrived.

One of the men was talking while pacing and gesturing in front of the other four who were seated on the same uncomfortable chairs as she was. She caught something about a lion and hope in the man’s speech – scratch that, it was definitely a babble, before another one of them snarled out, “This isn’t fucking Narnia, Jensen! Now sit down and _shut the fuck up_!”

The look on the face of the one called Jensen was one of a kicked puppy as he did like he was told, sitting down heavily on one of the free chairs.

The quiet of the space would probably have been awkward if everyone’s minds weren’t occupied by what was going on behind the closed door.

Dawn was yet to return when one of the two older men of the group approached and stopped in front of her. He was dressed in well-worn jeans with a red flannel shirt pulled over a plain black t-shirt. His posture screamed military and the fact she could tell he carried dog tags by the glimpse of the chain that caught the fluorescent light and the faint shape under his shirt pretty much confirmed it.

“Hi, you must be Buffy? I’m Clay… I’m Faith’s–“ he paused with indecision, obviously not sure how to introduce himself not knowing how much Faith had told her.

“I know who you are,” she interrupted him, saving him the effort of finding the right word to define the relationship he had with her sister slayer. There was no change in the stoical expression she had sported ever since she got the call even as she did feel sympathetic.

“Aah,” he breathed, acknowledging her statement but sounding like he hadn’t expected that which was fair. Faith didn’t exactly come across like she had close confidants. “Have you heard anything?”

“No, they’re still operating. It looks like she’s going to pull through. The doctor promised to send someone to tell if anything changed,” she told him. In an act of compassion prompted by his lost expression she added, “I’ll tell you if I hear anything.”

“Thank you,” he nodded and stared her for a moment, not certain if he should say something more. She turned her gaze back to the door having nothing else to say to him, and recognizing the dismissal for what it was he returned to his friends down the hall. She ignored the barrage of questions following and his answers, she had more important things to focus on.


End file.
